| Abstract: | This paper analyses the growth and decline of Taiwan's first significant third party, the New Party (NP). The NP won numerous
seats in the national parliaments in the mid-1990s and received extensive media attention. However, it has shown a steady
electoral decline since the late 1990s. Despite its poor recent election performance, the NP should not be regarded as a failure,
as it has actually been remarkably successful at achieving its original objectives. By 2004, the KMT's policy positions had
become so close to those of the NP that the NP was prepared to promote a party merger and allow its politicians to stand for
election under a KMT banner. I challenge the most common explanation that the NP rose when united and fell when divided by
bitter factional struggles. Instead a framework incorporating ideology, resources and political opportunity structure is employed
to explain the rise and fall of the NP. I argue that when the NP faced a benign political environment in the mid-1990s, its
moderate political message and rich human resources enabled the party to grow rapidly. However, after March 1996, the political
environment became progressively more hostile, and as the NP's resources were eroded and wasted and the party moved towards
a narrow and extremist political project, the party began its terminal decline. The space for the NP became even more limited
after 2000, when party had to face intense competition from a powerful new KMT splinter party, the PFP, and a rejuvenated,
united and orthodox KMT. |
